As explained in the first post of this three part series,  since my book, A Teacher’s Tale has been released, I’ve been rereading the manuscript’s first draft and some of its original sources.  Mostly, I did so to revisit the stories of students that were edited out, but I also reread accounts of my National Board (NBPTS) teacher certification.  I received good scores on lessons similar to those of many suburban teachers, but rock bottom grades on equally good or better lessons for hardcore inner city classes. Even so, I believe the National Board process was great and it left a record of the best and the worst of my school’s “Year from Hell” in 1998-1999. (All names are pseudonyms)

NBPTS required two videos of class instruction. One video featured an Economics class for students who failed those subjects in 9^th grade or who recently moved into the district. (Few people who move into our school are moving up the social ladder.)  I loved this class because both groups of students brought an unusually high number of fascinating (though often tragic) experiences to class discussions.

This class was Survivors 404. After one day Ester, who had just transferred from a standard “read the chapter and answer the questions” class but who would become a star of the video, was so frightened by our format that she asked to transfer, but her classmates talked her out of it. When viewing the video, it would be easy to fall in love with one exceptionally mature class leader.  She had shot her father.  One of the sweetest kids had been forced to stab her stepfather.

The only drawback to teaching this class was the emotional toll. The empty seats in the video testified to the number of kids who could not manage their pain and dropped out of school.  According to my application, however, we lost no more than five minutes of class time during the entire year as a result of behavioral problems.

Jack, a white rebel from California, fired up the debate with his typically inflammatory opinion and Ester reminded him of the assignment, “what would you do as Chairman … remember(ing) that you represent the entire nation?”  As always, Jack was challenged by a group of students who said that we should raise taxes in order to reduce the debt and create confidence.  Their main theme, first articulated by Ronda, was that the Chairman should persuade the nation to act for the common good.  Danielle, on the back row, argued that a tax increase would be a restoration of a more normal system (before the Reagan-era tax cuts) and not a radical change.

I called on Amy after I noticed her facial expressions when I mentioned the word compromise. She had obviously anticipated Jack’s arguments and, as usual, she sought to move beyond conflict.  Then, Ester recalled arguments that we had made for saving Social Security.   She applied their logic (i.e., start early, act gradually, and look to history as a guide) to cutting the national debt.  Ester said that Jack should invest his money where economic performance was predictable.

It wasn’t until Jack’s body language indicated that he would accept a reasonable tax increase that I started to look for an opportunity to interrupt, build on Amy’s point, and articulate a consensus. I earned my paycheck through intuition – by “reading” people – so my job was to time the intervention.  Then Ellen (who was so shy that she had come to the front to ask a question privately) made a comment, and  I replied to the class, “Ellen is so nice and quiet, and now I am going to jump all over her.”  After Ellen stopped laughing, I rephrased her statement and she agreed that I had been fair to her argument.

At that point everyone knew that I would say “read my mind,” I would articulate our common understanding, and make sure everyone understood the main idea.  Then, everyone knew that, conceptually speaking, I would pull the rug out from under them.  I did a pantomime demonstrating old-fashioned capital flight, with a banker loading his money (or Beanie Babies) in a cart and wheeling it to another country.  I temporarily persuaded everyone that the anti-Jack majority had won the debate and that the seemingly reasonable policy would be a major tax increase to control the deficits, but concluding, “You are right.  You have convinced me and won the debate.  Now, Jack is going to take his Beanie Babies, I mean capital, down to Brazil.  So, what have you won?”

Soon afterwards, the class articulated arguments against Jack and me, and together they brokered a grand compromise where the Federal Reserve gradually cut the money supply, taxes were raised gradually, and domestic and military spending were trimmed.  We also had a two minute interruption where I had to step into the hall. Since we were on the eve of the Kosovo intervention, the students used the break to debate foreign affairs.

Not everyone benefitted from the lesson, however.  Three students, who had too many absences to earn credit, had not returned their permission slips to be videotaped.  Three students who were satisfied with a D just wrote down enough of the concepts to get credit, and four students were away in In-House Suspension or elsewhere.  But 3/4ths of the class demonstrated a strong understanding of high standards of learning.  Succeeding with that percentage of students in the second semester of a year where we buried five students and recent alumni was quite an accomplishment, but under Washington D.C.’s IMPACT, it might have been used as evidence that I was an ineffective teacher.

In the NBPTS entry, I theorized about the kids’ political positions, and how they were an outgrowth of their personal tragedies. The discussion suffered because one of our class leaders was in jail, and another seemed to be going through a bout of depression; I soon learned that her problem was an unplanned pregnancy.  One class leader articulated pacifist beliefs – beliefs that became doubly clear a couple of weeks later when she gave a remarkable eulogy for a classmate.  Jack’s bravado was his response to a childhood cut short, as well as his extended time in the juvenile and adult sections of the Los Angeles County jail.  He said that the Baby Boomers did their generation a favor by abandoning them because, “It made us tough!”   None of the kids agreed with my liberalism because they had survived the legacy of my generation’s irresponsibility.

The following week proved that “Senioritis” had not set in. We completed the unit with a discussion of Thomas Friedman’s new work on globalism.  I explained how it had just been two weeks since I had learned of his analysis in the New York Times.  “You just learned it,”was the refrain.  “You have a Ph.D. and you just learned it.”  “Just learn this,” Mike said, “One month and we are out of here.”  Even so, we were proud of our class’s level of learning.  The globalism lesson evolved into a discussion of their future.  Eventually the class formed around two groups.  About half of the kids gathered around Jack’s and Ester’s desks and discussed their plans and dreams.  The other half gathered around the desks of a young mother and a couple of girls who virtually raise their sisters.  They talked about their work and responsibilities.

These seniors had survived daunting challenges, but they were seniors.  Their ordeals made them stronger.  My other NBPTS videotaped entry featured a freshman class.  It was a reminder of why so many troubled students didn’t make it to their senior year, and will be the focus of the final post in this three part series.